Author: Alex Davis

  • Frit Sale + Snowflake Stations – All October

    Frit Sale + Snowflake Stations – All October

    Frit is IT! From frit tinting to special effects, from river rock reaction to fritfetti, frit balls, pâte de verre, and even casting — you can work all kinds of wonders with frit. Visit your local Bullseye Glass Resource Center to save big on this magical material: 1 lb jar – 50% off5 ib jar –…

  • Working Glass 2024

    Working Glass 2024

    Bullseye employees do a lot with Bullseye glass: they melt it, roll it, sell it, package it, ship it, and teach the world ways to work with it. But they also love working with it themselves. Working Glass is proof. Since 2001, this exhibition of internal work—made after hours, often in employee studios or at home—has demonstrated…

  • Glass Cutting Basics

    Glass Cutting Basics

    Basic Principles A glass cutter does not saw glass. Rather, its cutting wheel “scores” the glass—creating a shallow fissure as it rolls across the surface. This fissure, or “scoreline,” breaks the surface tension of the glass and allows it to snap when pressure is applied downwards on either side of the fissure. The cleanness of…

  • Annealing Thick Slabs (Celsius)

    Annealing Thick Slabs (Celsius)

    Fusing thick glass? You’ll want this chart! A conversion chart that helps you determine annealing times based on the thickness of your project. Shows both rates in time to temperature and rates in degrees per hour.

  • Annealing Thick Slabs (Fahrenheit)

    Annealing Thick Slabs (Fahrenheit)

    Fusing thick glass? You’ll want this chart! A conversion chart that helps you determine annealing times based on the thickness of your project. Shows both rates in time to temperature and rates in degrees per hour.

  • TipSheet 7: Platemaking Tips for Well-Crafted Vessels

    TipSheet 7: Platemaking Tips for Well-Crafted Vessels

    Plates and platters are popular projects for both advanced and beginning kilnworkers, and platemaking is a perfect way to learn kilnforming’s two most frequently used methods: fusing and slumping. The tips shown here are the basic building blocks for more advanced kilnforming methods. Because the object is to make functional plates with smooth surfaces, these…

  • Mold Tips: Pyramid Casting Mold

    Mold Tips: Pyramid Casting Mold

    Glass Selection It takes 2090 g (4.6 lbs) of glass to maximize the mold form, resulting in a pyramid that is 9.5 cm (3.75˝) tall. Any form of glass may be used to fill the mold. Our illustrations show options for loading billet or frit. For smoother edges around the finished base, heap material in…

  • Mold Tips: Heart Casting Mold

    Mold Tips: Heart Casting Mold

    Glass Selection It takes 24 grams of glass to make a heart casting that is approximately 0.4˝(10 mm) thick (pictured). Examples shown were made with frit, but any form of glass may be used to fill the mold. For a thicker casting, use more material. For reference, 50 grams resulted in a 0.7˝ (18 mm)…

  • Mold Tips: Deep Form Three-Step Process

    Mold Tips: Deep Form Three-Step Process

    Overview This process involves slumping a 15.5″-diameter circle over the course of three firings. (Note: always measure your mold before cutting your glass.) Each consecutive firing shapes the form, ultimately resulting in a relatively deep, tall, steep-sided vessel. For our testing, we worked with an assortment of uniform-color 6 mm pieces (two 3 mm layers…

  • Mold Tips: Cone Bowl Molds

    Mold Tips: Cone Bowl Molds

    The following tips do not guarantee a uniform result. Because of the steep-sided nature of these molds, pieces may slump unevenly. Prior to slumping, prepare any of the Cone Bowl molds as directed in Tips for Using Bullseye Slumping Molds at bullseyeglass.com. Molds in the Cone Bowl series are especially versatile for handling glass blanks…

  • Mold Tips: Big Bowl

    Mold Tips: Big Bowl

    Note: The following tips do not guarantee a uniform result. Because of the steep-sided nature of this mold, pieces may slump unevenly.  Slumping Options We have achieved the most consistent results creating relatively even forms with the Big Bowl slumping mold (8973) by using it as the second part of a two-stage slump, combined with…

  • Mold Tips: Using Bullseye Slumping Molds

    Bullseye slumping molds are slipcast from a specially formulated clay body. They have an exceptionally smooth surface and accept kilnwash uniformly. If prepared with Bullseye Shelf Primer and handled properly, they will not crack under repeated use. Some artists report using their molds for months and even years without re-priming. Note: Mold measurements listed in…

  • Pre-Firing Your New Kiln

    Pre-Firing Your New Kiln

    One Final Preparation Step Before using a new kiln for glass projects, you will need to pre-fire it. This burns out binders, moisture, and other residue left over from the manufacturing process. New shelves can be slow to take on primer, so we recommend pre-firing them, too. To do this, coat your new kiln shelf…

  • TipSheet 8: Basic Lost Wax Kilncasting

    TipSheet 8: Basic Lost Wax Kilncasting

    Unleash Your Unlimited Forms Lost wax kilncasting is a versatile method for making glass pieces in almost any form imaginable. The process involves creating a refractory mold around a wax model. The wax is then removed—or “lost”—creating a cavity. Glass is cast into the cavity, resulting in a fully sculptural finished piece. This TipSheet covers…

  • TechNotes 1: Knowing Your Kiln

    TechNotes 1: Knowing Your Kiln

    Improve Kilnforming Results To achieve control in firing glass, it is necessary to understand how heat is distributed within the kiln you are using. Kiln heat is rarely even. Top-fired kilns tend to be hotter in the center. Side-fired kilns are frequently hotter around the perimeter. The pyrometer reads only one point within the kiln chamber…

  • 12 Ways to Improve Your Glass Cutting

    12 Ways to Improve Your Glass Cutting

    Basic Principles BUY THE BEST CUTTER YOU CAN AFFORD. If it helps you to cut accurately and comfortably, it will save you money in the long run. Look for a cutter with a comfortable handle and a high-quality, long-lasting wheel made of carbide steel. Inexpensive cutters designed for scoring float glass have neither of these…

  • Glass Cleaning Basics

    Glass Cleaning Basics

    Simple & Essential Cleaning glass before firing it removes problem causing contaminants like glass-cutting fluid, oils, minerals, salts, dusts, fibers, sticker residues, fingerprints, and pen marks. If these substances are not washed from glass before it is fired, they may be visible in the finished glass or may cause devitrification—the growth of crystalline structures on…

  • Safety in the Kiln-Glass Studio

    Safety in the Kiln-Glass Studio

    General Considerations Good housekeeping and common sense go a long way toward ensuring safety in the kilnforming studio. Ventilate your studio well, keep dust to a minimum, and confine hazardous materials to a limited area. Avoid eating and drinking in the studio. Toxins and dusts are easily ingested when you handle food and kilnworking materials…

  • TipSheet 6: Roll-Ups

    TipSheet 6: Roll-Ups

    A Brief History of the Roll-Up In 1993, Klaus Moje and Dante Marioni took part in the Connections project at the Bullseye factory in Portland. Together they explored the idea of blowing fused pieces. Moje would make tiles in the kilnforming studio, and Marioni would then pick them up on a bubble of furnace glass…

  • TipSheet 5: Bullseye Box Casting

    TipSheet 5: Bullseye Box Casting

    Reverse-Relief Kilncasting in an Assembled Mold This TipSheet describes how to create a reverse-relief cast glass object with the optical clarity of a furnace casting, using plaster/silica design elements in an open-faced mold assembled from vermiculite board and other refractory materials. There are several advantages to this process: • Less waste than traditional kilncasting processes…

  • TipSheet 4: Designing Your Own Art Glass

    TipSheet 4: Designing Your Own Art Glass

    Discover One of the Most Empowering Potentials of Glass Fusing Working with a palette of glass frit, powder, and stringers, you can create unique sheets of art glass to use in stained glass or fusing projects. Using the materials and techniques described in this TipSheet, you will no longer be dependent on the selection of…

  • TipSheet 3: Working Deep

    TipSheet 3: Working Deep

    Stack Firing for Embedded Imagery This TipSheet will introduce you to ways to float imagery and color within thick blocks of clear glass. Historically, thick glass castings have resulted from pours of furnace glass or by kiln-casting glass chunks or frit. The method we call “stack firing” results, instead, from the fusing of multiple layers…

  • TipSheet 1: Kilncarving

    TipSheet 1: Kilncarving

    A Simple Kilnforming Technique Developed by Rudi Gritsch “Kilncarving” is a term coined at Bullseye to describe a simple kilnforming process that achieves a bas relief, textured, or sculpted look in glass. The process involves cutting a pattern or design in ceramic fiber paper, then stacking glass on top of the pattern and firing the…

  • TechNotes 7: Monitoring Kiln Temperatures for Successful Annealing

    TechNotes 7: Monitoring Kiln Temperatures for Successful Annealing

    The Importance of Achieving Uniform Cooling When kilnforming glass, especially largescale work, it is important to cool the glass uniformly throughout the annealing range. The temperature difference within the glass—from top to bottom, side to side, or end to end—should be no greater than 10ºF (5ºC). Such uniformity prevents a number of problems, including the…

  • TechNotes 6: Preparing the Shelf System for a Large Kiln

    TechNotes 6: Preparing the Shelf System for a Large Kiln

    Creating a Reliable Shelf System Creating large, finished glasswork that is flat, uniform, and well annealed is highly dependent upon having a reliable shelf system. An ideal shelf system for a large kiln must have a continuous, seamless surface and be level, stable, smooth, durable, flat and able to transfer heat uniformly. With this TechNote,…

  • TechNotes 5: Volume & Bubble Control

    TechNotes 5: Volume & Bubble Control

    Understanding Distortion & Trapped Air When Firing Bullseye Glass Two common problems encountered when fusing glass are distortions of shape and unanticipated bubbles. To avoid these effects—or to engineer them into your work—you need to learn how to control volume and trapped air during firing. Understanding Volume When held at its full fusing temperature for…

  • TechNotes 4: Heat & Glass

    TechNotes 4: Heat & Glass

    The Unique Nature of Glass—the Supercooled Liquid Glass is an amorphous material. Its molecules are not arranged in a regular, specific pattern, like those of a crystalline material (such as metal), but are random in their configuration. Because of its amorphous molecular configuration, glass reacts to heat differently than do other materials. Metals, for example,…

  • TechNotes 3: Compatibility of Glass

    TechNotes 3: Compatibility of Glass

    Why COE Isn’t the Whole Story A misunderstanding that the compatibility or “fit” of two glasses is solely a function of their expansion properties has led to an overemphasis on “expansion” and the numerical value of the coefficient of expansion (COE) of glass. Studio artists continually ask us for the COE of a glass, hoping…

  • TechNotes 2: The Vitrigraph Kiln

    TechNotes 2: The Vitrigraph Kiln

    A Key Tool for Painting with Light Fused glass is frequently characterized by a cut-and-fit approach to design. Various shapes of colored glass are cut and fired to a base blank, often a tile or plate. While this is a valid method of working the material, it comes more from a collage or mosaic than…